CAMEO
babm.com/cameos
16 | APRIL/MAY/JUNE 2012
for working women
By Chary Southmayd
an “aha!” moment
Jessica Rivelli was doing what she had always wanted to do professionally back in 2008, working in the fast-paced television news business. After all, this homegrown girl from Hudson had followed her dreams. She graduated from Elon University in North Carolina with a degree in Broadcast Journalism, worked at a TV station in Greensboro, N.C., then West Palm Beach, finally landing back in the Tampa Bay area at WFTS-ABC Action News and then at WTSP- Tampa Bay’s 10.
But there was a void in her life. Rivelli longed to be more connected to the Tampa Bay community and to be more creatively inspired. As exciting as it was to be a television news producer, the job wasn’t fulfilling those personal needs any longer. “I was looking for an outlet, so I went on a mission,” she said. “I wanted networking opportunities that would educate, inspire and motivate me. I was craving that warm, fuzzy feeling you get when a bunch of women get together who support each other,” she said.
Her mission to find such a group proved to be frustrating. Rivelli said she wasn’t interested in “throwing on my power suit every day” for networking and chamber of commerce gatherings that, frankly, weren’t a lot of fun. She wanted a casual, friendly, supportive and fun networking group that was a good fit for her.
She couldn’t find it. It wasn’t there. So, what’s a girl to do? Why not create exactly what she is looking for, she thought?
In that “Aha!” moment, Rivelli embraced the path she would soon follow.
In November of 2008 while still working at Channel 10, Rivelli founded Working Women of Tampa Bay, with the goal of educating, motivating and inspiring working women. Her first event at Casa Tina in Dunedin involved a nucleus of four or five women who invited some of their friends and business contacts for drinks, food and swag bags. They featured a speaker, certified hypnotherapist Debbie Lane, whom Jessica knew from a TV story on which she had worked. Everyone loved the occasion. It was a winner!
That first social gathering of 35 women proceeded to grow in leaps and bounds. Working Women of Tampa Bay now has 650 paid members, plus another 4,000 who aren’t members, but frequently attend the events, and their “Facebook
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